ser2net.8

.TH ser2net 8 06/02/01  "Serial to network proxy"

.SH NAME
ser2net \- Serial to network proxy

.SH SYNOPSIS
.B ser2net
[\-c configfile] [\-C configline] [\-p controlport] [\-n] [\-d] [\-b] [\-v]
[-P pidfile]

.SH DESCRIPTION
The
.BR ser2net
daemon allows telnet and tcp sessions to be established with a unit's
serial ports or with an IPMI Serial Over LAN (SOL) interface.
.PP
The program comes up normally as a daemon, opens the network ports
specified in the configuration file, and waits for connections.  Once
a connection occurs, the program attempts to set up the connection and
open the serial port.  If another user is already using the connection
or serial port, the connection is refused with an error message.

.SH OPTIONS
.TP
.I "\-c config\-file"
Set the configuration file to one other than the default of
.BR "/etc/ser2net/ser2net.yaml".
If the filename does not end in
".yaml" or the first line in the file does not begin with "%YAML", the
configuration file is parsed as an old-style configuration file, which
should work but is no longer supported.  If the
.B config-file
is
.B "-"
then standard input is read as the config file.  This only supports yaml.
.TP
.I "\-C config-line"
Handle a single configuration line.  This may be
specified multiple times for multiple lines.  This is just like a
line in the old style config file.  This disables the default config file,
you must specify a -c after the last -C to have it read a config
file, too.

Note that this is the old-style configuration lines and is likely
to go away when old style configuration is removed.
.TP
.I "\-Y yaml-config-string"
Add a yaml config string to the end of strings to be processed.  This
may be specified multiple times for multiple strings.  These are
appended onto the end of a yaml config file; though if this is
specified, the default config file is disabled and you have to enable
it with the -c option.

To make things easier to handle, any # in the config string that is
not inside quote (what would normally start a comment in yaml) is
converted to a new line.  Plus a new line is added after each
separate config string.  So, for instance:

  -Y 'connection: &con01#  accepter: tcp,2013'
  -Y '  connector: serialdev,/dev/ttyEcho0,9600n81,local'
  -Y '  options:#    banner: "### A Banner ###\er\en"'

can be put on the ser2net command line.
.TP
.I \-n
Stops  the  daemon  from  forking  and  detaching from the controlling
terminal. This is useful for running from init.
.TP
.I \-d
Like -n, but also sends the system logs to standard output. This is
most useful for debugging purposes.
.TP
.I \-P pidfile
If specified, put the process id (pid) of ser2net in the pidfile,
replacing whatever was in that file previously.  A pidfile is not created
by default, you must specify this to create one.  Note also that this
filename must be specific with the full path, as ser2net will change
directory to "/" when it becomes a daemon.
.TP
.I \-u
If UUCP locking is enabled, this will disable the use of UUCP locks.
.TP
.I \-b
Cisco IOS uses a different mechanism for specifying the baud rates
than the mechanism described in RFC2217.  This option sets the IOS
version of setting the baud rates.  The default is RFC2217's.  Note
that this capability is now handled automatically and this option is
ignored.
.TP
.I \-v
Prints the version of the program and exits.
.TP
.I \-t <num threads>
Spawn the given number of threads for ser2net to use.  The default
is 1.  Only valid if pthreads is enabled at build time.
.TP
.I \-p <admin-accepter>
Enables the admin interface on the given accepter specification.
See "ADMIN CONNECTION" in ser2net.yaml(5) for more details on how
to configure this, and "ADMIN INTERFACE" below for details on how
to use it.
.TP
.I \-s signature
Specifies the default RFC2217 signature.

.SH ADMIN INTERFACE
The admin interface provides a simple interface for controlling the ports and
viewing their status. To accomplish this, it has the following commands:
.TP
.B showport [<network port>]
Show information about a port. If no port is given, all ports are displayed.
.TP
.B showshortport [<network port>]
Show information about a port, each port on one line. If no port is given,
all ports are displayed.  This can produce very wide output.
.TP
.B help
Display a short list and summary of commands.
.TP
.B exit
Disconnect from the control port.
.TP
.B yaml
Go into yaml output mode.  See YAML MODES below.
.TP
.B version
Display the version of this program.
.TP
.B monitor <type> <network port>
Display all the input for a given port on
the calling control port.  Only one direction may be monitored
at a time.  The type field may be
.I tcp
or
.I term
and specifies
whether to monitor data from the network port or from the serial port
Note that data monitoring is best effort, if the controller port
cannot keep up the data will be silently dropped.  A controller
may only monitor one thing and a port may only be monitored by
one controller.
.TP
.B monitor stop
Stop the current monitor.
.TP
.B disconnect <network port>
Disconnect the tcp connection on the port.
.TP
.B setporttimeout <network port> <timeout>
Set the amount of time in seconds before the port connection will be
shut down if no activity has been seen on the port.
.TP
.B setportconfig <network port> <config>
Set the port configuration as in the device configuration in the
.BR /etc/ser2net/ser2net.yaml
file.  If conflicting options are specified, the last option will
be the one used.  Note that these will not change until the port
is disconnected and connected again.  Options
.I 300, 1200, 2400, 4800, 9600, 19200, 38400, 57600, 115200
set the various baud rates.  The following speed may be available
if your system has the values defined and your hardware supports
it: 230400, 460800, 500000, 576000, 921600, 1000000, 1152000, 1500000,
2000000, 2500000, 3000000, 3500000, 4000000.
Parity, databits, and stopbits may be specified
in the classical manner after the speed, as in 9600N81.
This has the following format:
.B <speed>[N|E|O|M|S[5|6|7|8[1|2]]].
Setting serial options this way does not work on SOL, SOL has fixed
N81 serial options.
.I EVEN, ODD, NONE (MARK and SPACE if supported)
set the parity.
.I 1STOPBIT, 2STOPBITS
set the number of stop bits.
.I 7DATABITS, 8DATABITS
set the number of data bits.
.I [-]XONXOFF
turns on (- off) XON/XOFF support.
.I [-]RTSCTS
turns on (- off) hardware flow control.
.I [-]LOCAL
ignores (- checks) the modem control lines (DCD, DTR, etc.)
.TP
.B setportcontrol <network port> <controls>
Modify dynamic port controls.  These do not stay between connections.
Controls are:
.I DTRHI, DTRLO
Turns on and off the DTR line.
.I RTSHI, RTSLO
Turns on and off the RTS line.
.TP
.B setportenable <network port> <enable state>
Sets the port operation state.  Valid states are:
.I off
to shut the network port down,
.I raw
to enable the network port transfer all I/O as-is,
.I rawlp
to enable the network port input and device output without termios setting, and
.I telnet
to enable the network port is up run the telnet negotiation protocol on the
port.
.TP
.B reload
Causes ser2net to reload its configuration.  Any error output will
come out in the output, along with going to syslog.
.SS YAML MODES
If the "yaml" command is issued, echo is turned off and all output is
YAML compliant.  The form is basically the same as the non-YAML
output, with some minor adjustments to make it YAML compliant.  In
addition, all responses are in the form:

  %YAML 1.1
  ---
  response:
    <response info here>
  ...

If there is an error, it is returned in the response with the "error"
key.  If the command succeeded, no "error" key will be present in the
response mapping.  The "..." will be at the end of all responses.

The following commands are available in yaml output mode: exit,
version, showport, disconnect, setporttimeout, setportenable,
setportcontrol, reload,

If "%YAML" is seen in the input, YAML input and output modes are
activated, echo is disabled, and all input is expected to be in the
form:

  ---
  command:
    name: <command name>
    id: <optional id>
    parms: [ parm1 [, parm2 [...]]]
  ...

The id is optional and will just be returned in the response.  The
parms are optional, too, unless the command requires them.  Extra
parms are ignored, along with unknown keys in the main mapping.

Note that you have to deal with the "->" that is issued when the
connection is made, before going into YAML mode, YAML doesn't handle
that well.

In YAML output mode, you will get asynchronous reports of connections
and disconnections in the form:

  %YAML 1.1
  ---
  new connection: 
    name: !!str 'con1'
    remaddr: !!str 'ipv6,::1,59072'
  ...

  %YAML 1.1
  ---
  disconnect: 
    name: !!str 'con1'
    remaddr: !!str 'ipv6,::1,59072'
  ...
.SH CONFIGURATION
Configuration is accomplished through the file
.BR /etc/ser2net/ser2net.yaml .
A file with another name or path may be specified using the
.I \-c
option.  If the file ends in .yaml, it will be processed with the
new yaml parser.  If it ends in anything else, it will use the
old configuration file format, no longer supported or documented.
The old style configuration will go away at some point.

The yaml configuration file is described in ser2net.yaml(5)

.SH "SIGNALS"
.TP 0.5i
.B SIGHUP
If ser2net receives a SIGHUP, it will reread it configuration file and
make the appropriate changes.  If an in use connection is changed or
deleted, the actual change will not occur until the port is
disconnected, except that if you disable a connection it will kick the
users off.

ser2net uses the name (the connection alias) of the connection to tell
if it is new, changed or deleted.  If the new configuration file has a
connection with the same name, it is treated as a change.

This has some unusual interactions with connections that allow more
than one simultaneous connection.  It works just like the other
port, but the accepter is disabled and new connections will not
be accepted until all the existing connections are closed.

.SH "ERRORS"
All error output after startup goes to syslog, not standard output, unless
you use the -d option.

.SH "FILES"
/etc/ser2net/ser2net.yaml, /etc/ser2net/ser2net.key, /etc/ser2net/ser2net.crt,
/usr/share/ser2net

.SH "SEE ALSO"
telnet(1), ser2net.yaml(5), hosts_access(5)

.SH "KNOWN PROBLEMS"
None.

.SH AUTHOR
.PP
Corey Minyard <minyard@acm.org>